Skeptics Stack Exchange
Skeptics Stack Exchange

Questions tagged [games]

Games are activities played for fun. May also refer to sports. Use [videogames] for electronic games.

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Did the French Revolution cause people to give the Ace (in a deck of cards) rank above a King?

Wikipedia says After the French Revolution some games started to use the ace or 1 as the highest card which symbolized the lowest in society rising above the King. A discussion forum recently indicated that this reference is unverified, and…
New Alexandria
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Did a 700 percent increase in pencil sales occur in Britain on the back of the Sudoku boom?

A The Independent of London article, The rise and rise of Sudoku, claimed that: [...] sales of pencils in Britain are reported to have risen 700 per cent on the back of the Sudoku boom. A 700% increase seems objectively a disproportionate…
Carlo Alterego
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How accurate are the d20 dice used in role playing games?

The website Thinkgeek sells "High precision dice", citing this video as the explanation. No, you're not being superstitious when you stand at the counter at your Friendly Local Gaming Store test-rolling all the d20s. There ARE in fact "unlucky"…
Manu
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Does paper beat rock in RPS due an ancient Chinese tradition that draping paper over rock mean rejecting a request?

I have heard a few times that paper beats rock in rock-paper-scissors due to the following reason: It comes from an ancient Chinese tradition where when a request was sent to the ruler on a piece of "paper" or the equivalent at the time, the …
Franck Dernoncourt
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Did a Yu-Gi-Oh tournament prize card sell for $2 million USD?

I recently learned about a prize given out for the first ever Yu-gi-oh tournament in Japan in 1999, a stainless steel normal monster Black Luster Soldier. In numerous online english-language articles, the card is cited as being sold for $2 million…
Kevin Wang
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Is there a statistical advantage in playing KENO for a long period of time?

When I was in high school there was a story about a man who won millions of dollars playing keno. The amount of money and the location appear to be true based upon this wikipedia article: In 1994, Ranogajec reportedly won a $7.5 million Keno…
going
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Are there more 40-moves chess games than atoms in the universe?

I read this tweet recently: "There are more possible games of chess lasting 40 moves than there are atoms in the entire universe. Intriguing to know." I find this highly doubtful. Could anyone verify this for me please?
Vian Esterhuizen
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Is the shortest stalemate in chess ten moves long?

This is often stated as being the shortest stalemate ever, however, is it actually the shortest? I am looking for any brute-force attempts that show that 10 moves is the absolute minimum for a stalemate in the game of chess.
picakhu
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Did the Lydians invent games?

On this TED talk, Jane McGonical states that Lydians invented games a few centuries ago, as dice games they would play to forget about famine. 12:14 So, I take my inspiration from something that happened 2,500 years ago. These are ancient dice,…
tpianca
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Does Heads Up Texas Hold'em have more possible hands than atoms in the universe?

In the Vice (HBO) clip AI Poker Bots Are Beating The World's Best Players, it is claimed (at 2:00), that Texas Hold'em has "more possible hands than atoms in the universe". ..this competition featured a complex style of the game called Heads Up…
Fiksdal
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Is "Magic: The Gathering" the world's most complicated game?

For this question we stablish games as officially recognized board or card games. Several sources stablish that game as the most complicated one, although it does so by mentioning that a computer was unable to determine optimal play, although it…
user2638180
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Who coined "gamification" term?

According to wikipedia Nick Pelling coined the term "Gamification" in 2002/2003 as part of his bussiness model Conundra. Though the term "gamification" was coined in 2002 by Nick Pelling,[77] a British-born computer programmer and inventor, it did…
Rinnybinbin
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